I'd say keep contact to bags and shields and work on correct technique over and over and over. Kids love to hit the bags and its a nice introduction to feeling contact and impact on and around their shoulders, chest & arms.

Find some drills that help them understand the importance of teamwork in defence, line speed & communication. One of the most common errors from younger players is standing still as a defensive line and they'll continue to do it even after you've drilled them for weeks but eventually the work will pay off.

Away from contact I try to do as much with ball in hand as possible even if they're just running, as long as they carry correctly, pass correctly if they do pass etc then it's good skill development without actualy drilling for it.

Try to make as much of it games rather than drills. At all junior grades, focus should be on fun, but especially so with younger age groups. Remember, it's about skills development, not about winning matches.

I coached young kids from the age of three right through to eight.

The most important bit of coaching you can give at that age is handling. Unfortunately, I see kids who are nine and ten year old now (who have been playing a while) and they still don't have the basic skills.

If you can, ensure every player has a ball and then everything that you do, make sure it is with a ball. For example, a warm-up run - take a ball. Generally, kids at that age don't really need to warm-up and definitely no static stretching. Use warm-up games to switch their minds on more than anything else.

Again, at that age, start with evasion. Bulldogs is great, but if you have a lot of kids, it can turn into a bit of a safety nightmare.

Once most of the kids have the basic handling techniques, i.e. they can catch and make a simple pass, then move onto contact.

This is also a key stage as many coaches think that all kids can tackle straight away.

The best way to get the technique correctly (in my opinion) is to steal the RFU's 'tackle continuum'. This is where the tackle is built up over a number of stages. I'll try to summarise:
1 - Static tackle on knees (to get correct body position)
2 - Moving tackle on knees
3 - Walking tackle
4 - Jogging tackle and then pick up the pace.

Obviously pads and bags are good (and are fun) but how many times will a player tackle something that is soft and stationery?? The most important thing with tackling is to build up the player's confidence and remember this will not be at the same time amongst all players.

As has been previously mentioned, play lots of games and make sure that kids are kept involved at all times. i.e. don't have a queue of 16 players waiting to do a drill as the kids will get bored and distracted. Break them down into four groups of four.

The most important thing to remember is to make sure the kids have fun.

Drop me a PM if you like to discuss further.

Agility, Balance and Coordination games and exercises should form the bulk of your sessions as well as team building and communication. Focus on building the 'person' and the 'athlete' before the Rugby player, the age of trainability to teach these physical competences including proper running technique is vital as otherwise they will never reach their true potential. Use the game of rugby simply as a tool to deliver these skills ......oh and fun, fun, fun!!

See PM.

For contact skills, get them used to being in contact with the floor and falling to the ground which is an unnatural experience at first and needs to be practiced to build confidence. Wrestling games on knees are good as well as 'knee Rugby' for developing confidence and technique in the tackle.

Spot on Richie, GiantMisterE & Seth! Its pleasing to see some coaches who aren't all about winning the next game!

Will reply in more detail later, but thanks to all who have posted so far.

I coach under 7s at the minute at that age you really teach them the basics how to tackle, how to pass etc you can also bring abit of fun into by doing some games get them thinking, working as a team and also get them running around.

Thanks for the advice, appreciate you taking the time to let me know.

It's the games bit that I am struggling for inspiration for. I have stuck in the mud, raid the bases and cops and robbers (variation of tag along the lines of stuck in the mud). Finishing off with a game of bulldog, but i am concerned that the bulldog is a safety issue and could lead to injury or the weaker kids being put off.

Any input would be appreciated, I am scouring the RFU website and other union ones - its sad that the RFL provide so little relevent resources or at least have done up to now.

thanks

The RFU do have better coaching programmes for younger kids. It is a good idea that you have got some tags and I would forget about contact for the first few weeks and just work with tags on.

With tags, not only are evasion skills learnt a lot quicker, but the kids also get into some great natural body postions when pulling tags off that leads them onto proper tackling.

Also, at that age, it's all about repitition. Run the same session for 4 or 5 weeks doing exactly the same drills focussing on the basics. That builds up the necessary muscle memory in the kids. With the kids being so young, they won't realise they are doing exactly the same as last week but it builds up their skills really quickly.

Remember, practise doesn't make perfect, it makes permanent. So if they get into the habit of doing something wrong, they will always do it wrong!

At that age you dont need to worry too much about coaching them rugby, More aim at keeping it fun and making sure you keep your team together. You can slowly introduce new workouts with a greater rugby theme as your team gets closer to being registration age. Kids love Bulldog and it makes for a decent inroduction to contact rugby, Basicaly any session that involves lots of running around will go down well, both with the parents and the kids. Use the cards the RFL gave you but dont be too stringent with them, change them drasticly if you need to but they are a decent guide for the younger age groups.

Every so often make them a Assault course using the clubs gear ( tackle bags etc ) and make them work in teams to complete it, it takes a while to set up but its worth it. Once you get down to working on their Core RL skills concentrate on the real basics first, Catching, Running, Putting the ball down etc, with simple play the ball session. Start with you passing the ball to your kids and them running onto it, Catching and scoring a try ( I take it you dont coach alone? ) if you have 3-4 coaches doing this it will keep the kids interested. Once they get that down add another level, Make the kids pass from the play the ball, Then introduce a second pass, always only introducing new things as they get the hang of the last session's, but only when they are ready.

Try to have 3-4 different sessions and mix them up so they are working on the same things and routines but there is enough change to keep them wanting to come back. If your kids look like they are starting to lose interest in a session change it, at that age once you lose them it can be a nightmare to get them back, a quick drink break and change of game can sort that out usualy.

Try to keep talk of winning and losing to a minimum ( in team games ), its stupid at that age and once the kids get it into their heads it can turn into the only thing that matters to them. Lastly get your team doing a little chant or a hands in team shout at the end, they love it and it usualy helps foster a little team spirit and helps them believe they belong to a team. So a quick hands in, 1-2-3 and everyone shouts "Lions" ( for my club ) and they go away a little happier.

A decent session for me would be..

A 10 minute game of Battleship ( this is where the players run around a rectangle track and avoid being sunk by the outer battleships ( sunk means hit by a beanbag or soft ball ) When sunk the player joins the Battleships in trying to sink the players that are left. ( Key: Player > / battleship x / Cones = )
x x
========
= > > > > =
= ==== =
= < < << =
========
x x
Follow that with a 10 minute session of retrieving a ball, By rolling it to them, or passing it to them. Keep it simple.

Then a 10 minute session of catching, running and scoring as described earlier.

A little game of stuck in the mud and then finish with a game of Bulldog. Bulldog is a decent introduction to the contact element of the sport, you can start with tag bulldog and then work up to grab and full tackle at a later date, when your team are ready for it.

Hope even a little of that helps you in some way.

Thanks to all, got plenty to be going on with from all the posters - will let you know how I go on!

Just one other point, can anybody advise when they will be likely to be ready to play? With the interim season happening at the moment until (November?) and then the first summer season starting in the spring I understand that these kids will start in spring 2013 (they are all age 5 at 1st of September this year so year 1 at school) - can anybody confirm this as the club seem a little unsure.

thanks

They can play as soon as they turn 6.